Darkness.
Complete and endless.
There was no light, no sound, no weight—just an overwhelming sense of absence. The same void Damon had felt the first time he died, the terrifying silence of being erased from existence. But this time, he was aware of it. Aware of himself floating in the nothing, untethered, undone.
And then…
Something tugged at him.
It wasn't gentle. It was sharp, demanding, almost violent—as if something refused to let him stay dead. As if the void itself was being ripped apart to make room for him again.
Suddenly, Damon felt something press down on his chest. A sensation of weight. Of flesh.
He inhaled sharply.
His lungs burned, filled with blood.
He coughed hard—wet, choking, painful—and gasped for air as his eyes flew open. He was on the floor. His hands trembled. His body convulsed. The agony of returning was real, raw, and unforgiving.
He blinked rapidly, his vision blurred from the sting of blood and tears. His throat ached, the memory of the blade still lingering in his muscles. His heart was pounding—but whole. Alive.
Alive.
His mother knelt in front of him, calm and still, watching. Not relieved. Not surprised. Just waiting.
Damon stared at her with wide, disbelieving eyes, his lips trembling. "What the hell…"
She didn't say a word.
"I died, Mom. I know I did."
"And yet here you are, bleeding on my carpet..."
He felt his throat healing....he touched it, searching for the gash—there was nothing. Not even a line. He looked down at his chest, pulling open the bloodstained shirt. No wound. No scar.
His breath hitched.
It was true.
It was all true.
He couldn't die.
Damon sat on the cold floor, soaked in his own blood, staring at his mother—and finally believing, his blood-streaked hands still trembling, heart still hammering from what he had just experienced. The silence in the living room felt suffocating. His eyes darted between his mother and his own unmarked chest. No scars. No pain. No logical explanation that the world would understand. Only the truth she had just shown him.
He was... immortal.
Frightened. Confused. Excited. It all swirled in him at once, like a storm of emotions crashing into one another. "Are you…" he hesitated, voice raw, "Are you like me?"
Valerie didn't answer right away. She looked at her son—really looked at him. The blood on his collar. The confusion in his eyes. The panic under his skin. And then she nodded slowly.
"Yes," she said quietly. "I am."
Damon leaned back slightly, as if trying to absorb the weight of her answer. "How long?" he asked, his voice almost a whisper.
Valerie took in a breath, deep and heavy. She sat down across from him, the light above casting shadows on her worn face. "Centuries," she said softly. "I've been alive for centuries."
Damon's mouth opened slightly, but no words came. He couldn't even begin to imagine what that meant. To live through time like that. Through wars. Generations. Civilizations. "That's… incredible," he said.
But his mother didn't smile. She looked away. "No. It's not."
He furrowed his brow. "What do you mean?"
Valerie looked back at him, and for the first time, her face carried the weight of something darker—something bitter and hollow. "It's a curse, Damon. A beautiful curse wrapped in silence. Do you know what it's like to live so long that the faces of your children blur into ghosts? To wake up and forget the sound of your daughter's laughter? To forget the name of the boy you once held in your arms as he died of old age?" Her voice cracked. "And you remained."
Damon was silent.
"I've had sons. Daughters. Families," she said, voice lower now, as if it hurt to speak the words. "All of them gone. All of them dead before I realized what I truly was. Before I accepted that I would never age. Never die."
She looked at him again, and her gaze was firm now. "When I found out I was pregnant with you, I almost didn't keep you."
Damon's head snapped up. "What?"
"I was going to leave you at an adoption center. I didn't want to raise another child only to watch him grow old. Only to bury him again."
Her voice didn't shake. It was calm. Brutally honest.
"But I couldn't do it," she continued. "Something in me wouldn't let me walk away."
Damon stared at her, heart pounding.
Valerie leaned back, her eyes distant. "I never imagined you would be like me."
The room fell into silence again. Heavy. Meaningful. The light from the kitchen flickered faintly as Damon sat there, everything he thought he knew about life, death, and his mother unraveling around him.
Valerie stood from the couch, her movements slow and deliberate, as if the conversation had physically drained her. She paced for a moment, running her fingers through her dark hair, clearly wrestling with something heavy. Damon remained seated, his eyes fixed on her, waiting—bracing—for whatever came next.
She finally turned to him.
"This has never happened before," she said, her voice low, tense. "Not that I know of. Not once. In all the years I've lived, in all the stories the others whispered—never has an immortal given birth to another."
Damon stared, breath catching in his throat. "So… what does that mean?"
Valerie's eyes were sharp now, filled with something more than fear—something bordering on dread. She walked closer and placed her hands on his shoulders, gripping them firmly, forcing him to see the seriousness in her face.
"It means you're different. Damon, you're not just immortal… you're something else. Something new. And that makes you a threat."
"A threat?" Damon's voice cracked with disbelief.
Valerie nodded. "To the wrong people, yes. There are those who have been hunting us for centuries—our kind. They study us, trap us, dissect us. But you? You're going to make them desperate. Because you're proof of something they never believed possible."
Damon swallowed hard.
"You're in danger," she said finally, the words cold and certain. "Imminent danger."